Tomorrow will be our last day on the road for this trip. Over a period of 70 days, we will have driven ~11,735 miles through 19 states and 4 Canadian Provinces and have stayed at 36 campsites. It has been quite a trip!

Cades Cove in Tennessee seemed like the perfect place to end this sojourn. We both love it here and feel so comfortable and at home in the Smoky Mountains. Because we couldn’t drive the loop this sunup (no motor vehicles before 10 am) we decided to explore the surrounding area. We drove part of the loop and took off onto Parsons Branch Road, an 8 mile dirt road (driving time ~1 hour) through pristine forests and rippling streams. Rays of light filtered through the thick foliage as we wended our way over gravel and dirt. We stopped and picnic’ d  at the halfway mark.  It was wonderfully quiet and peaceful.

Old Wooden Bridge in Cades Cove

Waterfalls off of Parsons Branch Road

Then we hit Rte 129!!  It’s a twisty, winding road that is used by motorcyclists and sports car drivers as a seeming racetrack.  Here we were in our little Tracker, having just turned off our four wheel drive after the driving “hike” through the woods!  We were tailgated by “crotch rockets” & photographed around each curve by professional photogs who post their pix of the drivers on the internet for sale to the very same drivers!!  Well, at first we were intimidated by the traffic; however, we got into it & , even with the lowly Tracker, outpaced the sports cars on the tight curves.  Thankfully we slowed down just before the end of the curvy part of the road, as the cops were sitting at the bottom & pulling lots of drivers.  Pulling onto the Foothills Parkway, we worked our way back to the campsite.  A great last day!

Tomorrow I plan to be at the loop before sunrise to take in the best of Cades Cove–the amazing mist that envelops this valley–and hopefully get some good images.

Then it’s home. I will probably write one more post after this and recap our trip.